Mission tour, mariachi music, and more!

 Hola a todos! These past couple weeks have been kinda crazy! Sorry again that it's been a minute since I've written an email to everyone! So we don't have transfer news yet but we get the news next week so we'll see if I'm staying in Rancho Cordova or if I'm getting moved somewhere else because I've been in Rancho for like 5 months so that's kinda crazy! 

So we had our mission tour and Elder Gerard (a member of the seventy) came to the mission and it was so cool! It was so spiritually uplifting and he had so many good things to say and I learned so much from him! I also went on exchanges with Sister Estes and I learned a lot from her too! She is one of the sister training leaders in my zone and she is a really amazing missionary! That was a really fun day!

So then some other crazy things happened this past week! We gave Jesus cards to a mariachi band playing really loud music at a birthday party and they were down for it and we asked them if there was anything we could do for them and they said to pray that the cops wouldn't get called on them! Then we had the most WILD church party ever! Our branch held a party for fathers day and they literally were like cooking raw meat at the party by making this like giant fire but get this! They were throwing like dry grass in the fire and then like fanning out the smoke like crazy and dancing to like this super hype mexican mariachi music and it was a time and a half! Then we also contacted these two ladies selling popcorn and I've never been so empowered but intimidated! Anyways we learned some really wise and profound things like "3 scriptures a day keeps the devil away" and i don't think I'll ever forget that. 

We also went to the temple today and that was another really neat spiritual experience! I love going to the temple! 

We've actually started teaching a lot of people recently and it's really amazing how much the Lord has blessed us because of our diligence and following spiritual promptings! It's also amazing to see how the Lord has lifted me up from hard times I've been facing and how I've been able to heal from feelings of guilt and feelings of doubt and homesickness and other struggles because of Christ's atonement. This is really the Lord's work and not mine and I know that. 

Anyways I've kinda been having some spiritual thoughts pressing on my mind lately. So this transfer has been pretty hard sometimes and I've been struggling with a lot of different things like I mentioned before. The other week though we had a member dinner and we talked to her about the talk from last general conference by Elder Uchtdorf about finding joy in daily repentance and this member was basically talking to us about how she's found that our purpose in life is to have joy and that hard times will come but if we're miserable all the time, then there's something that needs to be changed. Ever since then I've really been applying that and even though there have been moments where I feel anxieties and inadequacies I've been able to overcome those and find the joy in missionary work! I've also found the joy in daily repentance. Every day I am imperfect and I've messed up and made mistakes and sometimes it's hard to come to terms with that but I've been able to repent from those and move on from those mistakes and try again. I know that Christ's atonement is real and that Christ is always waiting for you to come to him. 

Anyways! I love and miss you all so much! Please reach out to me for anything and I will update you all soon on what happens with transfers!

Love,

Hermana Clayton

Here are the pictures:

1- exchanges with sister estes

2- some ancient pass along card we found at someone's door

3- me and the other sisters at the temple